Iranian students voice support for occupy Wall street

GMT
12:12 2011
Friday ,07
October

Tehran - Fars

Iranian university students staged a protest rally in front of the Swiss Embassy - which hosts the US interest section in Iran - to voice support for Wall Street protests in New York and similar protest campings across the US.The students voiced support for the American protestors and condemned the New York police for clamping down on peaceful demonstrations. Demonstrators described the \"Occupy Wall Street\" protests as a representation of the American Awakening against the Israeli power lobby in the US, and the performance of US statesmen. The students chanted slogans like \"Down with America\", \"Down with Israel\", \"Liberal Democracy is finished\" and \"Confronting Islam is the Last Nail in the US Coffin.\" They also stressed that the US does not deserve to call itself a \'beacon of freedom\' and \'cradle of democracy\' particularly in the aftermath of the brutal and bloody police crackdown on the peaceful protests of the \"Occupy Wall Street\" movement. Protests against Wall Street entered their fourth week today as demonstrators across the US showed their anger over the wobbly economy and what they see as corporate greed by marching on Federal Reserve banks and camping out in parks from Los Angeles to Portland, Maine. Demonstrations are expected to continue throughout the week as more groups hold organizational meetings and air their concerns on websites and through streaming video. Similar protests have also started in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street Movement across the US, including Chicago, Boston, St. Louis, Kansas City, Mo., and Los Angeles. Some protesters likened themselves to the Arab Spring demonstrators who brought down their rulers in the Middle East. The Occupy Wall Street protests started on Sept. 17 with a few dozen demonstrators who tried to pitch tents in front of the New York Stock Exchange. Since then, hundreds have set up camp in a park nearby and have become increasingly organized, lining up medical aid and legal help and printing their own newspaper, the Occupied Wall Street Journal. About 100 demonstrators were arrested on Sept. 24 and some were pepper-sprayed. On Saturday police arrested 700 on charges of disorderly conduct and blocking a public street as they tried to march over the Brooklyn Bridge. Police said they took five more protesters into custody on Monday, though it was unclear whether they had been charged with any crime. Many expect the New York protests to develop into the often-violent demonstrations that have rocked cities in the United Kingdom since the summer. Some protesters planned to travel to other cities to organize similar events. John Hildebrand, a protester in New York from Norman, Okla., hoped to mount a protest there after returning home Tuesday. Julie Levine, a protester in Los Angeles, planned to go to Washington on Thursday. Websites and Facebook pages with names like Occupy Boston and Occupy Philadelphia have also sprung up to plan the demonstrations. As the inequitable distribution of wealth continues to worsen worldwide, a rapidly growing group of American protesters have occupied Wall Street since mid-September to express their rage at the capital of greed. The \"Occupy Wall Street\" movement is definitely not an isolated incident. It has come on the heels of similar activities in France, Spain, Israel and the United Kingdom, which sent the same message: members of the younger generation, all of whom are from developed nations, are angry and disappointed at their dim future prospects. The latest campaign in New York has given more tangible substance to their target, pointing to insatiably avaricious capitalist monsters as the villains depriving the younger generation of hope for the future. Members of the present generation are better educated than their parents, but when they spread their wings and prepare to fly, they run into snags at every turn. Many jobs have been transferred to cheaper places, and others have been taken up by foreign workers. Many people are not paid as much as the previous generation, and some cannot even find a job. The unemployment rate in Spain has topped 20 percent, and the jobless rate among German youths has reached 17 percent. There has also been a clear trend in recent years in which members of the middle class are sinking into poverty.